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His first thought is Sam. Sam, who must have cleaned up and patched up and dressed up his corpse, because Dean’s hair’s still drying at the back of his neck, and his clothes are intact and blood-free over superficial bandages, and he’s staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom with the First Blade humming faintly in his hand.
Actually, his first thought is that Crowley’s true face is ugly as hell, but the first thought that matters is of Sam.
“Get out.”
The aches and pains of humanity don’t pop in his joints when he rises and slides off the bed. Though he doesn’t deign to look at the King of Hell, there’s a new awareness in every movement, new demonic senses warning him that Crowley has power, letting him peek past that literal meatsuit. He waves the sharp end of the blade in the other demon’s direction.
“Now, Dean—”
“Scram.”
The King of Hell frowns at him, not so much angry as put-out and annoyed, but lets out a sigh and acquiesces, if only for the moment. Dean’s a Knight of Hell, and Abaddon has caused him enough trouble as-is.
There’s a sigh, a terse “You know where to find me,” and then Crowley teleports away in a puff of sulphur.
Dean stretches in the emptiness of the room. There’s a thrumming in his veins entirely distinct from the Mark, like adrenaline telling him to get going and get wild and get lost. The whole world is his oyster, human doubts and limitations unravelled and scattered to the winds, and in the demonic equivalent of his peripheral vision, he can feel Sam, somewhere near, somewhere in the bunker.
The bunker is different as a demon. As he traces Sam’s breadcrumb trail of ransacked tomes and scrawled notes and a couple tumblers of whisky, there’s the tingle of wards that would stop most demons but are powerless against a Knight of Hell. The air doesn’t smell of anything, because maybe demons just don’t taste things anymore, but when Dean pauses at the stairs down to the dungeon, he can breathe in something that almost feels like grief.
Or just the burnt out fumes of a failed summoning ritual.
He leans in the doorway and knocks as a courtesy. Sam’s back straightens and he whirls around from the devil’s trap. There’s a familiar delight to watching his face flip from alarm to shock to disbelief, it’s one Dean has very human memories about growing up, just the amusement of having the element of surprise over his little brother.
“Hiya, Sammy,” he says, casual as can be.
“Dean…” Sam doesn’t so much say his name as breathe it out like a prayer, “But you—”
He’s always been able to read Sammy like a book, but now there’s so much more, like turning up the resolution on a movie. Details in clarity and ease that human words would take so long to encapsulate. There’s the usual doubt, ‘this can’t be real blah blah blah’ as Sam takes tentative steps towards him, but past that is a tidal wave of relief Dean would happily drown in if drowning were a thing he was capable of suffering now.
“It’s me, I swear,” he says, though he supposes, in unison with Sam’s thoughts, that an impostor would say that. “The Mark… It’s clingy.”
He opens his arms and Sam crashes into contact. His brother breathes heavy into his shoulder, tears staining the clean plaid, and Dean reaches up to run a hand through matted hair. If he were still human, he might complain about Sam constricting his lungs, but the force of the hug barely registers, and all that matters is Sam’s heart pressed up against his, beating panicky-relieved staccato inside his ribcage.
Dean wouldn’t let go for the world.
“It’s okay, Sammy,” he says, and he turns his head enough to press a smile into Sam’s hair. “I’m not going anywhere now.”
Sam sucks in a breath, “But the Mark—” and when he tries to pull away, Dean’s arms don’t budge.
“We’ll deal with it,” Dean says, squeezing him just a bit tighter, a bit closer. Sam’s hunched over in this hug, he usually is, but Dean buries his little brother’s face back into his shoulder like he’s still little.
He can feel, he can see exactly when Sam connects the dots, a millisecond before the lax weight in his arms freezes tense. Dean rubs his palm flat against his back, but the cat’s peeking out of the bag. Sam’s arms withdraw from Dean’s shoulders until his fingers hang on by the tips. The relief vanishes.
“You smell like sulphur.”
Sam’s voice cracks into Dean’s shoulder. He tries to lift his head, but Dean digs his fingers into long, pullable hair the way he’d always warned Sam was a bad idea. He kisses the top of Sam’s head and murmurs.
“Sammy—”
But Sam shoves, hard as he can, and Dean lets him go. Not because Sam makes him, but because he can’t.
The perfect serenity shatters. Sam scrambles back, unsheathes the demon-killing knife and backs away far enough into the room to put the devil’s trap between them. The broadcasted fear and hurt and anger would trip the Sammy senses of human Dean, but demon him only spreads his hands open in a peaceful gesture. It’s okay, Sam’s just being cautious, Dean gets it.
“Exorcizamus te—”
“Really, Sam?”
It tickles like a sneeze that keeps building but never comes out. Dean crosses his arms and humours him the way a big brother’s supposed to. When Sam’s exorcism reaches the end he stutters on the final words and falls quiet, but the horror still radiates from his eyes and Dean can see it as clearly as if Sam’s soul were on the rack. He remembers how it felt to be human, remembers very clearly how it felt to see Sam afraid of him, and knows that this time there is no pang of guilt at the fearful look, no clawing of remorse. Sam’s scared of him. It’s not a bad feeling.
“You can’t be. You can’t.”
He’s been ignoring it for years, decades even. There’s no guilt and no remorse now, but Dean still brings his hands back up in a placating motion. Demons are all about selfish human wants, and Dean doesn’t want Sam to be scared of him. Not even if he delights in his little brother’s confusion.
“Hey, hey.” He takes a step forwards, but Sam flinches and holds out the knife. It was useless on Abbadon, Dean’ll wager it’ll be useless on him too, but he stops in his tracks and lets Sam have his space. “I’m not gonna hurt you. I’d never hurt you, Sammy, I need you to know that.”
Sam blinks rapidly. The knife trembles in his hand and so does his voice.
“You’re a demon, Dean. Demons lie.”
“Not me, not to you. I promise.”
Sam stares at him with all that doubt scrawled on his face. Thinks of the last time he trusted a demon, thinks of the way Dean reacted, thinks of the knife in his hand and Dean’s very much demonic veins and oh, isn’t that a thought? But then Sammy’s eyes refocus onto him, and his mind whirls with thoughts of murder and bloodshed and all the generic, basic, cliche demonic activities Dean could get up to.
“Let me cure you.”
“I can’t let you do that, Sammy.”
Sam throws him an annoyed look that almost makes things feel normal.
“Well I can’t just let you walk around as a demon, Dean!”
“Sure you can!” Dean grins, and there’s a thrill to seeing how Sam flinches and postures with the demon-killing knife that he doesn’t need to suppress anymore. “And you will, Sammy, because you wouldn’t hurt me.”
Sam proves him wrong immediately by upending the nearby bucket of holy water in his direction and bolting for the door.
Fine.
It’s almost cheating. If they were both human, both unhindered, Dean could give Sam enough credit to say they’d be evenly matched, but Sam’s still hesitant and Dean’s not human, so no matter how clever his baby brother is, it was only ever going to end in Dean’s favour.
Still, it’s fun to rile Sam up, let him think there’s a way out, until he realises there isn’t. There’s a power that Dean’s never really had over Sam in years, and he doesn’t need to lie anymore and say he doesn’t like it. He does, he always has, and he always will.
Of all the Seven Deadlies, people really misunderstand lust, ‘cause c’mon, sex is the easy way out, you don’t even need a soul or a brain for that. But if lust’s an automatic ticket to Hell, Dean’s been lusting for his baby brother’s undivided attention, dependence, and loyalty since the heartbeat he realised Sam didn’t come with a lifetime guarantee.
He’s always liked teasing Sam, liked having the upper hand, because then Sam would need him to fix the problem Dean started, like before the kid shot up in the vertical, Dean would steal whatever book he was reading and hold it over his head just to see Sam jump up to try and get it, whining and fighting the whole time.
The only way out is for Dean to let him out.
The demon-killing knife jolts from Sam’s grip and flies blade-first into the wall, just before Dean tackles him into the ground. Sam wheezes, back against the floor, the wind knocked out of him, but gives an obligatory struggle neutralised by telekinesis and Dean’s own weight.
“Dean, please—”
He reaches out to brush his little brother’s panic disheveled hair out of his eyes. Sam just won’t shut up about how Dean has to still be in there somewhere, how his human self wouldn’t want to stay like this, repeat ad nauseum. Dean tunes him out the way he normally would when Sam's saying something stupid, and instead takes the moment to rub his thumb over Sam’s cheek. His little brother flinches from his touch, a lovely shine of fear overlapping with those familiar puppy dog eyes. Sam’s an open book of pain and guilt, Dean doesn’t need demonic mind reading to know that.
“Sorry, kiddo. This is me.”
Sam’s head presses back into the bunker floor, but there’s nowhere left to go. His expression shutters and the fear is compartmentalised.
“You gonna kill me then?”
“I told you I wouldn’t hurt you,” he says, drawing his hand away from Sam’s face, sitting on Sam’s lap. “I’m still Dean, y’know, still your awesome big brother who’s supposed to look out for your dumb ass. Sailing without my moral compass ain’t gonna change that.”
Sam doesn’t even deign him with a bitchface. Sammy’s smart enough not to take it at face value.
“Then what do you want?” he demands, ever the annoyed little brother.
Dean stares a little too long at Sam’s mouth and throat and eyes. He knows exactly what he wants, and what he wants as a demon is the same as what he’s always wanted as a human, festering from the cracks of his now corrupted soul, wrapped around his heart long before he took on the Mark, before Purgatory and perhaps even before Hell.
Human Dean would lie, but human Dean isn’t here anymore. There is no morality pushing him to shove the thought down, no fear in scaring Sam away for good, no guilt gnawing at him because how could you and how dare you and Sam would hate you. Nothing but selfish desire and all the power to see it through. It’s a free pass on all earthly responsibilities and then some.
But Sam isn’t a responsibility, he’s what Dean wants. Lust in the archaic sense.
The First Blade tugs at him when he unsheathes it, sings with bloodlust and pulls him towards Sam, to cut him apart and pick out everything that keeps his mortal body going, pull his skin back and tick off the ribs guarding baby brother’s bleeding heart. It’s visceral and slow and calculated in a way Dean hasn’t bothered with since the Seals. There was no time to savour things when you’re stopping the Apocalypse, stopping Leviathans, murdering your way through Purgatory and all the rest.
But here, now, with Sam tense beneath him, he can take all the time he wants.
The blade swings down and Sam flinches, but it lodges into the ground inches from his ear instead. Dean laughs, low and teasing, as Sam’s eyes swivel between him and the knife. For a second, Sam’s lip curls in indignance, but Dean starts stripping off the layers of flannel and that annoying little brother snarl vanishes.
Left with just his undershirt, Dean yanks the blade out of the floor and curls his fingers around the hilt. He keeps his eyes on Sam’s wary ones, even as he brings the blade down on his bared forearm, because the hazel hues burn with such a lovely, radiant horror when Sam realises exactly what big brother has planned.
“Dean, don’t you dare—!”
He lets up a little on the pressure just to feel the muscles straining under his legs. Sam's eyes fix to Dean’s skin, watching the knife leave a trail of startling red. He bites his lip.
“No,” Sam squeezes his eyes closed, his upper body rattling. “Dean, don’t, please.”
Good big brothers don’t push that hard, shouldn’t get that rush of satisfaction from holding their baby brothers off a cliff’s edge and being the only lifeline to safety, shouldn’t love it.
Thank Hell he’s not good anymore.
“Come on, Sammy.” He sets the blade aside and leans over, free hand landing next to Sam’s fanned out hair, his silhouette casting shadows over wide eyes. “You know you want it. Big brother ain’t some run of the mill demon, I’m top-shelf, baby.”
Sam presses his mouth firmly shut, lips pinched white. Gravity waterfalls the blood off of Dean’s wrist, but Sam jerks his head to the side and the drops splatter onto his cheek instead, fresh red on skin.
His brother is a mess of panic and guilt, breaking into a shiver at the proximity, and the drops trickle vibrant down his face, past his ear, into his hair.
It’s beautiful.
He could wrench his jaw open and make him. Could savour the struggle and tears. But Sammy’s all chick flick moments and emotions and talking and stuff, and there’s a different satisfaction to wearing Sam down from his defiance.
He wants Sam to want him back, too.
“It’s for your own good, y’know,” Dean says, using demon cheat codes to turn Sam’s face around. He buries his hand into Sam’s hair just for the feeling of those long strands tight between his fingers. He’d always warned Sam some monster might just take advantage of it. Who knew it’d be him? “It’s like when you were five and hated olives on pizza.”
In any other situation, Sam would retort that any vegetable on pizza was an affront to greenery, but Sam’s decided now’s the ideal time to shut the fuck up. Red platters onto his lips, and he twitches as it pools between the shut curves and trickles down the side of his jaw.
The demon reinforced skin is clotting up and the blood’s starting to crust on his skin. He could envision any number of ways to do this faster, like coming back with a hostage and torturing them until Sam drinks, but this is their first time, it’s supposed to be lovey and meaningful with rose petals and violins and crap. Maybe later, Dean’ll round up some demons and make a show of it, exhibitionism and all, and remind everyone why Sam’s supposed to be sacred to Hell. Not because Azazel picked him thirty years ago, not because God decided he’s Lucifer’s meatsuit—Dean twists his wrist to tug at Sam’s hair and Sam twitches at the pain; maybe if Dean leaves enough marks it can overwrite everyone else’s claim—but because he’s even more dangerous than any one of them down there, and half of that is because he’s Dean’s.
Dean carves another slice and red renews the previous path. Sam’s glare wavers with every fallen drop, unable to look away, unable to fight. A muffled groan makes its way up the back of his throat, and Dean can see the way his muscles go taut from the effort of staying still, even as streaks of red run down his neck and into his hair.
“Sammy,” Dean chides, like they’re kids again and Sam’s being brattier than usual. “You’re way too old to be force-fed. Do I have to do the airplane?”
Sam’s eyes shut again and Dean sighs. He lets go of Sam’s hair and sits back on his brother’s hips. He should spend more time cuddling up to Sam. He’s warm. It’s perfect. Human him was stupid not to.
He holds the blade aloft and splits his forefingers open on the edge. Sam’s eyes linger, until Dean leans back down to rub the thin stream of red over Sam’s pinched together lips. Sam muffles a protest, but then Dean punches Sam under the ribs with his free hand and it’s all over.
Sammy tries, bless his stupid heart, but baser instincts prevail and when Dean shoves three fingers into his mouth, sharp teeth clamp down hard enough to break skin, and Dean grins, victorious, as Sam tries to spit the digits out, tries to scramble away, groans and refusals choked incoherent by blood and saliva and Dean.
Bleeding fingertips run over Sam’s tongue, feeling the muscle push back and away, listening to Sam yell against him, twisting under his weight, eyes unfocused in alarm. He can see the moment the revulsion caves into hunger, when Sam’s eyes shift from fear into desire, and then he’s lapping his tongue around each one of Dean’s fingers, sucking and swallowing and pressing into the slit skin for even a drop more and the thrill that runs up Dean’s spine is better than anything he’s ever felt in Hell.
He leans down to kiss Sam’s sweating forehead, free hand coming up to comb his matted hair back. There’s a flush to his brother’s face, a distinct, messy, literal blood lust to his eyes as he bites down into the healing skin to break it anew.
“Easy, bro,” he soothes, sitting back up with a teasing tug to Sam’s hair. “There’s more where that came from.”
He pulls his fingers clear, bite marks indented red and slick with saliva and blood, and Sam whines, tries to lean up to chase them with his mouth. He’s no longer shaking with fear, but with hunger, and Dean's about to lose his mind, because fuck, Sam’s beautiful, lips red from blood and touch, and his eyes a fully blown starving black inside a melting ring of hazel resolve.
It’s everything he’s ever wanted.
But then his brother gasps, breaks out of his daze and tries to breathe, shuts his eyes again and turns away, and everything in his head roils with disgust and revulsion and shame.
Maybe there is some part of Dean that’s still human, the part of Dean that spent years and years riling Sam up to mess with him, pulling pranks and practical jokes until Sam snapped, the part that went to Hell and became one of Hell’s best because huh, it turns out taking souls apart isn’t that different to pushing his brother’s buttons. Maybe, because there’s a familiar, gleeful challenge in working to crack Sam right open.
Dean pulls them both up, positioning himself on Sam’s lap, and nonchalantly brushes Sam’s hair behind his ears. Sam flinches, just mobile enough in Dean’s little telekinetic puppeteering, and it’s kind of like chaining souls to the rack, with just enough give to feel them squirm.
He grabs the blade, cuts a third line intersecting with the first two, and watches Sam’s face twist, blood-pink teeth sinking into his lower lip, sees the tremble as he tastes the wasted blood around his mouth. He can’t seem to decide if Dean or Dean’s crisscrossed forearm is more deserving of that starving lustful-in-the-dictionary-definition fixated stare. But despite Sam’s crumbling control, he’s still trying to fight it, still trying to be good and pure and Dean knows it’s his own fault for that.
“Hey.”
Sam’s eyes fix on him, then dart away, away from Dean and away from the blood. Anyone could read the shame on his face, in the shake of his shoulders, the clench of his blood marked jaw.
He sets the blade down.
“Sammy...”
He cups Sam’s face, ignoring the blood smearing at the bend of his arm, and Sam stiffens, doesn’t meet his eyes, and opts once again for silence.
“It’s okay,” his voice goes soft and gentle, because Alastair and the old guard never really understood that there was more than one way to skin a soul. “Hey, look at me.”
Sam does, but he doesn’t really have a choice anymore. Dean rubs his thumb across Sam’s unstained cheek and gives him that warm, endeared smile. For a second, Sam’s expression melts into that sad puppy look.
“It’s okay if you want this,” Dean says, the strong, confident, reassuring older brother, and he brings up another hand to press at the back of Sam’s neck, fingers tangling through the long-enough hair. “I’m not gonna hate you, I promise. I know I said a bunch of stuff before, with Ruby and—” his breath catches and he trips over his words, perhaps a little too theatrically, and his eyes break away for a second. “But I didn’t get it back then, I was scared back then, and I was fucked up from Hell and—and you were always hanging around Ruby, Sammy. I mean. You’re the brains of this thing, if you can fuck up demons on your own, if you don’t need me on your six because you got a better partner than me—”
“Dean...”
Sammy sounds like a kid again, pleading for Dean not to leave for elementary school without him, pleading for Dean not to go on a hunt without him, pleading for Dean to stay with him, and Dean damn near passes out from that rush of validation because fuck, yes, this is what he’s always wanted, this is what Sam’s never given him, not in years. That Sam needs him just as much as Dean needs him.
Then Sam sucks in a breath, and when Dean brings his eyes back up to Sam’s face, his expression is too controlled, too defiant, and it’s eighteen year old Sammy telling him he’s leaving for college and taking the other half of Dean’s soul with him.
“I know what you’re doing.”
A trill of pride drowns out the snarling frustration. Now that’s something he’s never felt on the other side of the rack. Sammy’s a fighter through and through.
It’s all right. Dean’s waited years for this. He can wait just a little bit longer.
“Bitch,” Dean shakes his head, affection in his eyes.
The blood from earlier has dried on Sam’s cheek, and two jagged lines have set down the sides of his jaw, vanishing down the curve of his neck, but Sam is past freaked out struggling and just shivers beneath Dean’s touch. It reminds him of when he had to wrap blankets around the two of them during winters as kids, when Sammy would tuck himself under Dean’s chin, nestled against his chest, and they’d act as each other’s heaters.
He presses his hand to the back of Sam’s neck and pulls his baby brother into the crook of his shoulder, just like old times, before Sam shot up in teenagerhood and never let Dean coddle him again. Sam won’t stop shaking, still too tense, still too on edge to relax like he had all those years ago.
It’s kinda killing the mood.
“Why are you like this?”
“I’m a demon, dude,” Dean rests his chin on top of Sam’s matted hair. “Means I get to do whatever I want now.”
“And you want… to hug me?”
“Maybe,” Dean cards fingers through his hair and starts idly untangling the strands. “But mostly I just want you.”
Sam breathes slowly, sinking into Dean’s hold. He’s still shaking, but Dean thinks it’s just the adrenaline now.
“Dean… Please.”
“I don’t want to be cured, Sammy,” Dean sighs against Sam’s ear and feels him flinch. “I finally feel free. Free to love you, and want you, and take care of you, even if you don’t really want me to.”
Sam shudders again, sucks in a pained breath, but he buries his face into Dean’s shoulder, and Dean understands. Sam would never take what he wants, but Dean is an awesome big brother who will take the choice to say no away from him.
Dean shoves him down onto his back, and slots the inside of his wrist right against Sam’s open mouth. Sam strains for a moment, but then the heat settles against Dean’s skin and teeth dig into the healing wounds. Dean lets Sam get one hand on Dean’s shoulder, the other on his bicep, and he can’t even tell if Sam’s trying to push him away or push his mouth into Dean’s skin. Dean lets them roll over, until Sam’s the one sitting on Dean’s stomach, a much more manageable weight with demonic blessings.
His arm slams into the ground beside his head, raised and angled so that Sam can dig half-circles into the forearm. Canines break clotting cuts and new skin, Sam’s tongue pushing against the expanse, then he pulls back for air and suction and Sam’s hair is tickling his chin and Dean can’t see his face but if this is anything like what it feels to have a vampire feed on you, he might finally understand the entire bloodsucking romance genre from years ago because holy shit.
Sam pulls away, doesn’t even look at him, just yanks Dean’s undershirt off like he’s a late night hookup at a bar, and Dean wonders if Sam won’t just go full cannibal and eat him right up, flesh and all, because he’s never seen this raging hunger and need directed at him before.
He wonders if that’d be so bad.
Even as a demon, he doesn’t think himself a masochist, but Sam’s grabbing at his chest, his arms, pushing him down and down and digging into the intersection of Dean’s neck and shoulder like it’s the corner of an ice cream carton—and Dean can’t find this anything but wonderful.
“There we go,” Dean brings his hands up to pet Sam’s hair and pulls him closer, relishing the urgent breaths against sweat and blood soaked skin. “Tastes good, huh? You better tell me it’s better than anyone else you’ve had, Sammy, ‘cause I’m pretty sure lying’s a sin.”
Sam lets out a low groan and nips at unbroken skin harder as if to tell him to shut up, before returning to trying to suck the damn hell out of him. His junkie of a baby brother is no amateur and making short work of his jugular, but Dean’s not human anymore, so fuck it, Sam can rip him apart like a steak for all he cares.
Dean laughs into his ear and drags Sam’s hair between his fingers. He just might reconsider the past decade of bitching at Sam to cut it, because it’s different when he’s the monster grabbing Sam in the dark.
“Take whatever you want, baby brother,” he whispers, running his fingers through messed locks, “I gotcha.”
Sam’s hand is branding indents on his upper arm, the other holding onto Dean’s free shoulder for dear life, and Dean briefly considers keeping all those marks, just to carry a literal bit of Sam with him.
“I told you it wouldn’t be so bad,” he presses a kiss against Sam’s hair and can’t tell if he loves Sam’s roiling thought of guilt disgust repulsion more than Sam’s tongue digging into bite marks and whining for more. Maybe it’s both. “Not gonna stop taking care of you just ‘cause I’m a demon. I love you, remember?”
Sam’s breath hitches, because they don’t say those words. They patch each other up and buy each other’s favourite foods and give their souls for one another and fuck everyone else over to stay together, but they don’t say those words.
Dean pets Sam’s hair, ignoring the chill of the bunker floor against his back, instead listening to Sam’s lips smacking warm and wet over Dean’s skin, the grunts of effort coaxing more blood into his mouth, and the gulps of satisfaction. It’s not until Sam’s breaths go from heaving in exertion to shaking erratically that Dean realises his brother is crying.
“Hey, hey—”
Sam tries to punch him, or push off of him, but it’s a foregone fight and Dean sits up and pins him to his lap. Sam hisses hysterical breaths between building sobs, blood on his mouth, staining his chin, the sheen of sweat on his face broken by tears, his chest rising and falling harsh, shining hazel eyes clenched shut in shame.
Dean’s never seen such a beautiful sight.
“‘S okay Sammy, you’re doing great,” he murmurs, letting one wrist go to run the pad of his thumb over Sam’s exposed cheek. A choked whimper leaves Sam’s throat and he leans into Dean’s touch before his brain catches up and he flinches away. Dean pulls him into a hug in recompense. “You don’t have to hold back. I got you.”
“Enough—” Sam rasps, and his hands find Dean’s bare chest, but the trembling scrabble of his hands feel more like baby brother seeking reassurance rather than pushing him away. “I’m done–I can’t—”
“You can,” Dean brushes his hair aside, pressing a kiss to Sam’s cheek, murmuring into his skin just to feel Sam’s shudder wrack all the way down to his chest. “Come on, Sammy, I know you can handle just a little more. I know you want this.”
“I don’t—!”
Sam’s fingers are still scratching at him, but he’s hooked now, no matter what he consciously says. He’s all Dean’s. He pushes Sam’s head on his bleeding shoulder, feeling his brother recoil and whine, but Sammy’s physiological needs crush his inhibitions like a soda can, and soon a warm-hot tongue licks over the incisions once more.
Dean’s completely forgotten about the perfectly serviceable knife next to them, but fuck it, he’s a demon and it’s kind of nice to feel Sam so desperate as to literally rip him open. He pats Sam’s back, and runs gentle fingers through his hair to contrast Sam’s attempt at excavating his collar with his teeth.
It’s just like when they were kids, comforting Sammy after a nightmare or a stomach ache or a particularly close hunt. Sam, perched on his lap, arms curled in between their chests, and Dean holding him close, one hand at the back of his waist, the other thumbing through TV channels or caressing Sammy’s hair.
“‘S all right, Sammy,” he murmurs, relishing in how Sam leans into him, broad shoulders shuddering with the sharp gasps and groans of a fragmenting self-control. An arm curves around Dean’s neck, then back to leaving a handprint shaped bruise on his shoulder, then moves again like Sam wants to push them so close they’ll break into liquid and meld together and can’t figure out how. “I got you, just let big brother take care of you.”
Sam finally settles on looping his arms under Dean’s, dragging them closer and cementing his fingernails into Dean’s shoulder blades. Dean chuckles to himself and rubs circles into Sam’s still clothed back while Sam’s mouth moulds over broken skin, starved and feral in a way Dean never fully appreciated when he was human. Back then it was all about Sam being a monster and what Dad said and fuck that, Dean thinks, as Sam breaks away, panting cooling breaths on Dean’s sweat and blood and spit-dampened skin, before he cranes his head back down to start chewing through the other side of Dean’s neck, and Dean laughs into Sammy’s sweat soaked hair again.
“That’s it, Sammy,” he hums, petting Sam’s hair and preening when Sam pushes into his touch. “I’m all yours, baby boy, never was able to say no to you, y’know.”
Sam groans, and it almost sounds like embarrassment. His mouth pulls off his skin with a pop and the hold on Dean slackens. Their eyes meet, and Dean’s delighted to see Sam’s have gone black, not wholly like a demon’s, but what thin ring of hazel iris there is is almost imperceptible in the lingering shadow of hunger.
His little brother’s hands pull away to shove Dean down on the floor, landing on either side of his head. That hungry look whittles down to anger and betrayal, and at last, Dean lets the telekinetic binds release.
Sam’s expression shatters and he all but collapses onto Dean, head between bloodied shoulders.
“Why?” Sam’s voice breaks against his chest, trembling all over. “Why?”
Dean smiles, unseen, but presses his palm to the back of Sam’s head and pets his hair again, like he’s comforting, like he cares only in the gentlest, most benevolent of ways.
“I want to take care of you.”
“You’re lying.”
Sam pushes himself up, hands seizing Dean’s shoulders, smearing blood onto his palms. He glares down, furious, snarling, eyes rimmed with red from tears, hair falling around his face and curtaining them both from the rest of the world.
“It’s always been you, Sammy,” he pats a hand against the wrist holding him down, smiling honest and wild. “Remember that Siren during the Apocalypse? It was always you. All I’ve ever wanted was you to need me as much as I need you. And now I know you will. You’re never gonna leave me again. Not now. Not ever. Understand?”
His declaration rings out in the space of the bunker, and Sam’s shocked breathing is endlessly soft in comparison. The hazel has returned, closing in on black pupils, and Sam just stares, still weighing down on Dean’s shoulders, lost and confused and pained.
“Dean…”
Sam pulls away, but Dean snarls and flips them over. Hands push back at his chest again, but Sam can’t stop him now, will never be able to stop him ever again. There’s no more guilt of overriding Sam, no more fear of scaring him, just the pure selfish obsession Dean’s had long before either of them walked through Hell.
“You’re mine, Sammy,” Dean holds Sam so closely he can feel the panicked beat of his heart and the short breaths against his bitten skin. Sam chokes back a sob. “I love you so much.”
Fingers press into his back, and Sam can’t seem to decide between scrabbling away or hugging back. His forehead presses into the junction of Dean’s bare neck, his chest rising and falling with hitching breaths, and it’s going to take more than just blood to wear Sam down, but it’s a step in the right direction, and they’ll make it to the end.
“Stay,” Dean answers at last. “I just want you to stay.”
Sam breathes in a pained gasp, then finally goes lax and melts into the bloody embrace.
“I will.” he says, and it’s only everything Dean has ever wanted to hear. “I'll stay. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere without you. I'll stay.”
Dean pulls back and smiles so widely he could rip the flesh off his cheeks. Sam's eyes are sad and pleading and Dean closes in until their noses touch and he can feel his little brother's erratic breaths on his face.
“Promise me, Sammy.”
Sam sucks in a breath, and looks at him with beautiful, teary dark eyes.
“I promise.”
They seal it with a kiss to Sam’s forehead.
